


after me

by ebonynightwriter



Series: Waava Week 2014 [1]
Category: Avatar: Legend of Korra
Genre: Aftermath, Beginnings Era, Canon Universe, Comfort, Gen, One-Shot, Post-Beginnings, Tension, Trauma, Waava Week 2014, War, Worry
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-17
Updated: 2020-10-17
Packaged: 2021-03-09 05:08:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 731
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27069139
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ebonynightwriter/pseuds/ebonynightwriter
Summary: The first time Wan encounters death after Harmonic Convergence, it scares him in more ways than one.
Relationships: Raava & Wan (Avatar), Waava, Waava (Platonic)
Series: Waava Week 2014 [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1975627
Kudos: 13





	after me

**Author's Note:**

> **A/N:** Posting this in October 2020, this was originally published in October of 2014 on tumblr ([original post](https://ebonynightwriter.tumblr.com/post/99883524357)) for that year's Waava Week. You can find the other posts of mine for that year's prompts (including some gifsets) [here](https://ebonynightwriter.tumblr.com/tagged/mine:%20waava%20week%202014/chrono).
> 
> -.-
> 
>  **[waava week 2014 // day 1](https://ebonynightwriter.tumblr.com/tagged/mine:%20waava%20week%202014/chrono)** · immortal
> 
> -.-

He wakes in a tent after the battle is finished. The air stinks of blood and smoke, but he knows by looking to the men standing by the entrance that the Lord Saaju’s forces have held the land appointed to them by the Water Lion Turtle.

Well, that and the fact that he’s not _dead_.

“Hey, you made it, kid,” a voice calls out next to him. Wan looks back into the tent, coming face to face with an older water soldier lying on the bed next to his. His arm is in a sling and there’s a bandage over one half of his face, but the man’s eyes are bright blue and shining, a trait shared by the rest of his people. Wan recognizes the man. They spoke briefly before the battle begun, but he cannot recall his name.

Wan holds his hand toward the man, holding him by the wrist and giving it a firm squeeze.

“You did, too.”

“Yeah… not by much, though. One of those fire tosser’s threw an attack right at my head, I moved _right_ as the flame went by. But I guess it wasn’t enough…” the man trails off, his fingers hovering above his damaged face and Wan tries not to stare at the edge of raw skin sticking out along the cloth, taking his gaze to the rest of the men in the room.

“Heard you fought well,” the man continues, his hand flopping off the side of the bed. “A ‘one man army’, they’re saying.”

“Who?” Wan asks.

“ _Everyone,_ ” the man says. “Even some of the fire soldier’s we captured keep talking how their side burned down everyone in their path except for you. Some of them are saying you’re one of those immortal spirits dressed in human form.”

“I’m just a man,” Wan says. “A wanderer, nothing more.”

“Well, that ‘ _nothing’s_ got a whole lot of something,” the man says with a grin. “We could use more men like you, that’s for sure.”

Wan smiles.

“Get some rest,” he says. “You’ve earned it.”

The man faces the ceiling of the tent and pats his chest. “Yes, I have.”

Silence filled the tent as the man falls to sleep and outside, Wan can hear the sound of feet shuffling and the snap of flames. He stares at the ceiling of the tent for what feels like an hour, his hand slowly reaching up to the middle of his chest until he hits something hard and raised in its center. The man had been right with his words, he was in sense a ‘one man army’, but it didn’t mean he couldn’t die. And out of all the things he’d expected to hit him in that battle, an arrow straight to the chest was not one of them.

He finds the ends of the wire the doctor used to stitch him up, and runs his finger on the swollen bumps.

He should have seen it coming, blown air or lifted earth to block its path but he _didn’t_. Wan moves his finger around the wound, and finds pain, but no memories. He can’t recall how long into the battle he was struck, how long it took him to get help. All he can remember is the arrow hitting him and fear, creeping into every corner of his mind. Fear of death – fear not having enough time to set things right.

Wan lays his hand on his chest, and feels warmth swell from beneath the skin.

“Raava?” he speaks to the air. “I have a question.”

_“Yes, Wan?”_

“What happens to you when I die?”

 _“I do not know,”_ she speaks, the core of her voice echoing through his body. It was almost like having a second mind, in a way, but the thought of it never caused him much joy. What he did at Harmonic Convergence – touching the Southern Portal in a last-ditch effort to save the world from darkness – it wasn’t a plan. He was just acting on instinct, and now Raava was trapped within him. Part of his being through and through. She didn’t even have a physical form anymore… He took everything from her.

And if he died…

 _“It will be alright,”_ she says, as if hearing his thoughts. _“We’ll figure something out.”_

His eyes close, his fingers brush his skin again.

“Something, huh?”

Wan can only hope she’s right.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading!


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